Hello ya, I'll ask the questions first then write about my chronic ep(if ya feel like reading it) to see if anyone else has any suggestions, anything you write is greatly appreciated...

1. I'm confused as to what is better, applying cold or heat to the infected area, I mean when its hot in the pants, I seem to "flare up" a bit but when cold I feel better. I'd figure go with what makes it better but man cold balls is no good.

2. I've read much about herbs and multivitamins such as fennel, fennugreek do the people who find relief from them find it during a flare up? or do you take it everyday and it decreases your pain and occurence of inflammation?

I probably could ask 100 or so questions but these are what I wanna know right now.

My story,
I'm a 19 year old student named James. Got ep in feb 04, it was very painful back then, I went to one doc and he didnt do anything just looked dumb and made me go to this other doc 2 weeks later, that doc made me get a ultrasound and he told me it looked like I had an inflammed epididymis, then I went to this urologist he reccommended, that guy gave me doxy and told me if it didnt cure it I had a varicocele. I researched varico's and met up with a doc who was an expert on em and he told me I didnt have one, it was most likely epididymitis.

So I've been living with it for 6 months now, my symptoms are, pain, discomfort in lefty most of the time, It doesnt affect my walking and I'm not sick from the pain, when I've been doing strenuous activity it hurts and makes walking tough, but I rarely ever do that since I got it. It's not a big cramp on my lifestyle really since I'm a poker player and a computer engineering student, both things that require me to be sitting a majority of the time. It doesnt get me down or anything, I mean I could spend a lifetime being pissed off at it and it wouldnt get me anywhere I try to focus on the road ahead.

I wish I didnt have it, I often think how wonderful a day it would be if I woke up and never had to deal with it again. I think that following yalls advice with the herbs/chiro/temperature will bring me one step closer to that day, its a great thing this board was created cause man I've been wondering for 7 months if there were others like me going to many diff docs and getting nowhere fast.